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CLASS NOTES COLUMBIA COLLEGE TODAY
Many Columbians gathered in Cooperstown, N.Y., for the June 30 wedding
of Katie Day Benvenuto ’03, associate director, athletics development,
and Dan Benvenuto, associate director, events and ticket operations
for Columbia Athletics. The ceremony was held at Christ Church
Episcopal and the reception at the famed Otesaga Hotel. Several of
the bride’s suitemates were in attendance, including (left to right) Amy
Schultz ’03, Samantha Lee ’03, Emily Doyle ’03, Stephanie Reeder ’04
and Debbie Kaplan ’03. Also on hand were numerous colleagues of the
couple from the athletics department.
PHOTO: THE CLASSIC IMAGE
03
Michael Novielli
World City Apartments
Attention Michael J.
Novielli, A608
Block 10, No 6. Jinhui Road,
Chaoyang District
Beijing, 100020, People’s
Republic of China
mjn29@columbia.edu
Season’s Greetings to you and
yours. As we approach our ninth
year since graduation, more and
more members of our class have
husbands, wives, domestic partners
and children with whom to celebrate
the holiday season(s). More
news on that in this column. If you
have an update to share with me,
I encourage you to do so through
the CCT website: college.columbia.
edu/cct/submit_class_note.
Jessica Macari (née Slutsky)
and her husband, Ariel, welcomed
their first child, a daughter, Layla
Hannah, on June 30 at 10:43 p.m. She
weighed 6 lbs., 6 oz. and was 19½ in.
Phillip Chu writes, “My wife,
Flor, and I had our first child, Isabella
Mai, on January 12.”
After getting married in a barn
in Iowa, Julia Green and her husband
moved to Chicago; he is an
actuary and she is finishing up her
first novel. Eric Kriegstein writes,
“I am completing my M.B.A. at
UCLA this year. I married Brielle
Anderson this September in Vermont.
Columbians present at the
wedding were Doug Imbruce ’05,
Daniel Goldman ’04, David Brumberg
’04 and Joey Fischel ’04.”
On October 16, 2010, Nyssa
Fajardo married Chris Lee at St.
Patrick’s Cathedral in New York
City. The couple was honored
to have Nicole Washington as a
bridesmaid. The reception took
place at the Mandarin Oriental,
where guests danced late into the
night. Other Columbia alumni in
attendance included Bram Alden,
Andrew Brill, Tito Hill ’05, Jamal
Trotter, Hanoi Veras ’03L, Brendon
Pinkard ’02L and Leah Threatte
Bojnowski ’04L. The couple resides
in Manhattan. Nyssa is an associate
general counsel for Hudson
Heights IPA and Chris is a principal
at Apollo Global Management.
Ben Casselman writes, “The
biggest and best news off the top:
In May, I married the beautiful Erin
White in my parents’ backyard
on Cape Cod. Spectator was well
represented: Adam B. Kushner
was a groomsman and gave a stirring
toast, and former Spec editors
Amba Datta, Megan Greenwell
’06 Barnard and Maggie Gram ’05
were in attendance.
“Erin and I met in Dallas, where
I’ve been a reporter for The Wall
Street Journal covering the oil and
gas industry. That turned out to be
an interesting beat last year, when
Russell Gold ’93 and I led the paper’s
coverage of the Gulf of Mexico
oil spill. Our coverage was honored
with a Gerald Loeb Award and was
named a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize.
“After surviving the hottest summer
in U.S. history (no joke), Erin
and I are preparing to leave Texas
to move back to New York, where
I’ll cover the U.S. economy for the
Journal and Erin will look for opportunities
in journalism and public
relations.”
Polly Auritt lives in Venice Beach
with Chris Kosfeld ’02 and works at
MTV in scripted television.
Sheref Hassan writes, “I am
finishing my residency in orthopaedic
surgery in the Albert Einstein
College of Medicine/Montefiore
Medical Center program. In August
I started my fellowship training in
orthopaedic surgery sports medicine
at Union Memorial Medical
Center.” Defne Amado graduated
with an M.D./Ph.D. and is doing a
residency in neurology at Penn.
Alfred Chung writes, “I’m in my
second year in the M.B.A. program
at USC Marshall School of Business.
I’m also working on a new startup
idea called Site Unseen. I enrolled in
a Startup Weekend event recently,
pitched my idea, formed a team,
built a product demo and pitched
the business plan and product
demo to a panel of judges from the
startup community here in Los Angeles.
After 42 business ideas were
presented, then eight final pitches,
we won! You can find more information
about Startup Weekend and
Site Unseen here: uscnews.usc.edu/
business/entrepreneurs_in_action.
html and here: siteunseenla.com.”
Sam Arora writes, “My first bill
in the Maryland General Assembly
became a law — it was a law to
close a loophole in Maryland’s gun
laws so that criminals trafficking
in illegal guns would have to serve
their sentences. It went into effect
October 1.”
A.J. LaRosa has relocated to
Burlington, Vt., where he will
join the firm of Burak Anderson
& Melloni. His practice will focus
on environmental, land use and
complex civil litigation. In 2009, A.J.
teamed up with a number of skiers
to found famousinternetskiers.com,
a web-based publication dedicated
to inspiring back-country skiing adventures.
A.J. is the weatherman for
the site and publishes detailed and
accurate forecasts for mountain locations
across the Northeast. If you
are ever in Vermont and want to ski
some powder, drop him a line.
Don Lee went on a weeklong
sailing trip in Turkey/Greece with
Nadim El Gabbani, Vanessa Karlo
’03 Barnard, Ian Coogan ’02 and
Alison Traweek ’03 GS.
04
WINTER 2011–12
90
Angela Georgopoulos
200 Water St., Apt. 1711
New York, NY 10038
aeg90@columbia.edu
Hello, CC’04!
I hope you are all doing well.
Just a friendly reminder to send in
your news and updates — don’t
be shy! Feel free to email me at
aeg90@columbia.edu or contact me
via CCT’s web submission form:
college.columbia.edu/cct/submit_
class_note. On to the news:
Jacob Barandes earned a Ph.D.
from the Department of Physics at
Harvard and joined the department
as a lecturer in physics. Alisa
Weilerstein is one of the 2011
MacArthur Foundation “genius”
grant recipients. Kelley Remole
earned a Ph.D. in neuroscience
at Columbia this past spring. She
married Lucas Bejar in 2009.
Congratulations to you all!
Liz Mulaikal finished medical
school and an internal medicine
residency at Georgetown. In July,
she came back to New York City
to begin a three-year fellowship in
pulmonary and critical care medicine
at NYU. She also reports that
there was a mini Columbia reunion
with some of the lacrosse girls in
May at Adrienne Moll’s wedding.
Congratulations to Daniel
Wise, who married Laura Gee ’04
Barnard. Daniel teaches 10th grade
humanities at High Tech H.S. in San
Diego. He has a master’s in secondary
English education from Pace
and is pursuing a master’s in school
leadership at the High Tech High
Graduate School of Education.
Last, but definitely not least,
congratulations to Blake Wallach
’04E, who married Lina Tipografshik
in September at Oheka
Castle in Long Island. Bernadine
Goldberg ’04 Barnard, Angela
Georgopoulos and David Neistadt
were on hand to help celebrate
the happy couple.
05
Peter Kang
205 15th St., Apt. 5
Brooklyn, NY 11215
peter.kang@gmail.com
Lauren Mancia and Adam Gidwitz
’04 were married this past June in
Lenox, Mass., and a gaggle of Columbians
were there to cheer them
on. Adam and Lauren now live in
Brooklyn Heights, where Lauren is
working on her dissertation in medieval
history from Yale, and Adam
is writing his second middle-grade
novel, which is due out in August
from Penguin. His first, A Tale Dark
and Grimm, was featured in CCT in
the March/April 2011 issue (college.
columbia.edu/cct/mar_apr11/
bookshelf1), was named a New York
Times Editor’s Choice, and came
out in paperback this past August.
In January, Lauren’s dissertation
research will bring them to France,
where they will live in Paris and
Rouen for eight months. If you’re
interested in subletting their apartment
from May–August, contact
Lauren at l.mancia@gmail.com.
On September 4, Rebecca Weber
married Ben Carver in Breckenridge
on a bluebird Colorado day.
Several Columbia alumni attended,
including Rebecca’s father, Joseph
Weber Jr. ’81J, bridesmaid Lindsay
Joelle Glabman and friends Rena
Rudavsky, Isaac Kohn ’04, Cara